It's pretty common thing on Asus boards for 'em to freeze for a few seconds when entering the hardware monitor page. I've seen it on a few non-Asus boards too... I have no idea why it happens.

As for the shavings, it's hard to say. It could've just been old thermal material or some other mung that was stuck to the bottom edge of the heatsink. Or since it's one of the old piss-yellow boards, it could be that you did scrape the solder mask, but can't see it since the traces underneath are a pretty similar color.

In any case, it sounds like the board still works fine, so I think it's safe to pretend it never happened and try not to do it again.

Old Thrashbarg wrote:

It's pretty common thing on Asus boards for 'em to freeze for a few seconds when entering the hardware monitor page.

Seconded, my P5Q-E board does that. I guess it takes a while to initialize or pull the data from the sensors or whatever.

Thanks - I think I just needed to hear someone say that

I would say that getting those coolers on and off is one of the trickiest parts of building a computer - once you get one on LEAVE IT ALONE

ncmark wrote:

On trying to remove it, the scredriver slipped out and across the MB 🙁

I've done that a few times and it really freaks me out. Is it really feasible to damage a motherboard that way, given that Phillips-head drivers tend not to be especially pointy?

I'm not sure how you'd expect to go about removing a clip-on heatsink with a phillips screwdriver. Normally you'd use a standard for that.

But yes, it is certainly possible to wreck a motherboard with a screwdriver slip. I've never personally done it, but I've seen a fair number of boards that were damaged in such a way, and I've even had to repair traces on a couple.

[Thread moved to Marvin Section]

Even though this is an interesting thread, I do not see a point in moving it to Marvin. Board 'aint *that* old...